Monday 17 January 2011 15.59 EST
First published on Monday 17 January 2011 15.59 EST

Football teams are a bit like jigsaw puzzles. As Gérard Houllier is acutely aware, managers' jobs often hinge on successfully transforming them from jumbles of non-complementary pieces into perfectly fitting wholes.

Despite Aston Villa's precarious Premier League position of 17th, Houllier has clearly convinced Randy Lerner that Darren Bent will prove a perfect fit and not only help the club avoid relegation but put it back in the European picture.

Given Martin O'Neill's recent failures to persuade the Villa owner to break the bank in similar style, allied to suggestions that his successor, Houllier, is "under pressure", this may come initially as a surprise. It should not.

Despite a disappointing past few months at Sunderland, all the available statistics suggest Darren Bent is one of the few strikers around worth investing about £20m in, not to mention smashing the squad's £65,000‑a‑week wage ceiling.

The team Houllier inherited from O'Neill had been tantalisingly close to Champions League qualification but, for all his pace, doubts lingered as to whether Gabriel Agbonlahor was really the right striker to transport them there.

Bent might be. He has scored 32 Premier League goals in 58 appearances since swapping Tottenham Hotspur for the Stadium of Light in the summer of 2009. Since summer 2005 his Premier League goals tally – with Charlton Athletic, Spurs and Sunderland – is 81. Only Didier Drogba and Wayne Rooney – who boast 82 – have scored more.

Unlike that pairing Bent was not playing for Chelsea or Manchester United but less ambitious ensembles creating appreciably fewer chances. A concern is that this season he has plundered a modest haul, by his standards, of eight league goals but that probably reflects a lack of service.

Bent excelled when playing off Kenwyne Jones, the former Sunderland target man sold to Stoke City last summer, and receiving largely left-sided assists from Andy Reid. While Reid, who conjured many of Bent's strikes, has latterly been out of favour with Steve Bruce, the Sunderland manager has also frequently sidelined his other creative midfielders, Steed Malbranque and Bolo Zenden, this season.

Houllier is not overly concerned that Bent does not look comfortable playing in a front three with the £13m Ghana striker Asamoah Gyan and the Manchester United loanee Danny Welbeck. Instead he is confident the framework afforded by Villa's developing jigsaw will enable Bent to reinvigorate his dormant England career.

Like Reid, Stewart Downing possesses a magic wand of a left foot and one of the reasons Villa are adamant the winger will be staying put this month is a managerial conviction that Downing's promptings will send Bent shooting back up the goal charts. If the striker will similarly enjoy connecting with deliveries from Ashley Young, Marc Albrighton and perhaps even Stephen Ireland, Bent will also surely revel in playing off Villa's fabulously unselfish Emile Heskey. He is a different forward from Michael Owen but there are sufficient similarities in their games to suggest this combination could prove as successful as Heskey's one-time international pairing with Owen.

With Agbonlahor and John Carew failing to muster a league goal between them all season, Houllier will certainly be hoping so. For the moment, though, O'Neill's successor must be thrilled simply by a bid for Bent which can be interpreted as a massive vote of confidence from Lerner.

All the indications are that it is just that. But, even if the Villa board entertain private doubts about their manager, Bent's prolific – and, importantly, largely injury-free – past suggests his apparently gargantuan cost will offer a reassuring, albeit expensive, insurance policy against relegation.

The price of dropping into the Championship would be considerably higher, particularly as Villa's player contracts do not contain clauses automatically triggering a drop in salary if Premier League status is lost. This realisation, reinforced by the team's accrual of 15 points from the last 51, perhaps explains a seemingly radical policy departure on Lerner's part.

After packing his bags when it became apparent the American – who has invested £179m since assuming control of Villa four years ago – was actively embracing a sell-to-buy policy in the summer O'Neill must be shaking his head in disbelief.